It all started with the decision to change a floor. Ruined and dangerous for the inhabitants of the Ciglio and the many faithful, who from other areas of the island go up to the slopes of Epomeo, to honor San Ciro, whose cult has been rooted in that place for over a century.
But once the work had begun, the structure revealed that it had been erased in summary terms, distorting the nature of the small temple that had been built over the course of two centuries. It was thus decided to recover the peculiarities of the church buried by time.
Under numerous layers of plaster applied over the decades, the green tuff stone came to light, characteristic of that part of the island and unique in the world. A simple and precious raw material, which gave the church the appearance dating back to the reconstruction following the devastating earthquake of 1883, which also hit the sacred building. Expanded starting from 1893, until it assumed its current dimensions and shape. It was precisely with green tuff that the new structure was gradually built. The supporting columns and arches placed on the sides of the single nave, severe yet welcoming, were made of tuff.
The recovery of the ancient green tuff required long and complex work, which began in 2005. Thanks to this, the building highlights a harmony and a "personality" that it had never possessed in living memory. Thanks to the involvement and enthusiastic participation in the project of local artists and artisans, together with the commitment of the "Ixion" cultural association and the then parish priest Don Angelo Iacono.
Thus, the floor was created, of a sweet natural color, on which a majolica decoration created by Francesco Calise discreetly stands out. Sculpted by Ambrogio Castaldi, the twisted columns and the decorations of the columns are made of green tuff with motifs that recall the local products of the land (wheat, olive trees, grapes, birds to indicate game). And a large carved tuff stone also forms the base for the altar. Another local craftsman, Michele Iacono, is the creator of the wrought iron appliques. Colored glass was chosen for the large windows which lets in light and allows you to admire the green cloak that dominates the church. For the large window on the main façade, the colored glass, from the Vietri school, depicts the Madonna Assunta, to whom the church is named.
In a circle under the ceiling, a Last Supper is painted in a simple and essential style, the work of two contemporary Ischian artists, Michele Cocchia and Antonio Cutaneo, also creators of another fresco on a wall and of a beautiful triptych located on the the other side of the transept. From ancient times, in the church there remain a wooden Christ and a beautiful canvas, which also needs to be restored, depicting The Assumption, by an anonymous painter of the late nineteenth century.
The hidden source
The evocative church hides something truly unpredictable and unique within its interior. It is the particularly cool temperature and a sweet background murmur that push the visitor to enter, through a large room wrapped in tuff, into a sort of natural cave. In which a stream continuously feeds a pool of crystalline water, which reaches as far as Frassitelli, on Epomeo. That spring has been known for centuries and was used regularly by the locals for their own consumption and to water their livestock. Initially, when the first nucleus of the church was built, then dedicated to San Giacomo, the spring flowed behind the small building, in the rock, and then re-emerged a little further on in a field, where even today there are those who go to get the '"water of San Ciro". Then, with the subsequent expansions of the church, the source ended up being incorporated into the structure, as it still is today, although finally valorised as it deserves.
